Half Sick of Shadows

by E.A. Week

The barren planet Gossan holds a powerful secret, one that is somehow connected to River Song's release from prison. Can River and the Eleventh Doctor defeat the Papal Mainframe, or will they become its prisoners for all eternity?

4. Chapter 4

Title: Half Sick of Shadows (Chapter Three)

Author: E.A. Week

E-mail: eaweek at hotmail-dot-COM

Date of publication: May 2012.

Summary: The barren planet Gossan holds a powerful secret, one that is somehow connected to River Song's release from prison. Can River and the Eleventh Doctor defeat the Papal Mainframe, or will they become its prisoners for all eternity?

Category: Doctor Who. Eleven/ River.

Distribution: Feel free to link to this story from another web page, but please drop me at least a brief e-mail and let me know you've done this.

Feedback: Letters of comment are always welcome! Loved it? Hated it? Send me an email and let me know why!

Disclaimer: Copyrights to all characters in this story belong to their respective creators, production companies, and studios. I'm just borrowing them, honest!

The story title is shamelessly stolen from the ballad "The Lady of Shalott," by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

Datclaimer: This story is rated M for sex, language, and mild gore/ violence.

Continuity (PLEASE read this): This story follows after the events of Doctor Who, season six. I assume that this story will be rendered apocryphal/ alt-universe/ moot/ irrelevant once Steven Moffat decides to continue telling the story of the Silence. This is my version of how events might play out.

Chapter Three

The loud roaring resolved into music—incongruous music: mellow, unobtrusive jazz. The Doctor caught the scent of spirits and the smoke from countless generations of cigars and cigarettes. He stood in some kind of store-room: crates piled against the walls, furniture swathed beneath dust-sheets. He made his way forward through the gloom, toward an archway illuminated by soft light filtering through a beaded curtain. The Doctor pushed aside the beads and entered the room, blinking in surprise.

He recognized this place: a drinking den in World War II London. He'd come here looking for the Chula medical transport ship that Jack Harkness had sent crashing to Earth. On the walls, posters reminded patrons about air raids.

The room was empty, though, save one large, round table, around which sat eight men playing cards. The Doctor approached the group, disbelief mounting inside him. His eyes scanned the hair, the faces, the clothes. It was him—his past selves—well, the first eight of them, anyway. The Doctor couldn't tell what game they were playing, but they'd divided into teams, and the Doctor observed with interest how they'd paired off.

One and Six had formed an alliance—naturally, the Doctor thought: both of them united in their arrogance and puffed-up sense of self-importance. Two and Seven—the small, devious clowns—were another pair. Three and Four—tall and lordly, secure in their imposing physical presence—worked together, looming over their fellows. The Doctor forced himself to look at Eight—the pariah, the one who'd lost the Time War. Not too surprisingly, Five, the kindest of the lot, had taken the outcast under his protective wing. None of them were speaking, the game carried out in silence, the only sounds the occasional quiet snap of cards being placed on the table.

The Doctor tore his gaze away from the table, scanning the room, searching for his two most recent incarnations. There—at a small table in a far corner. Nine was reading, obscured by the newspaper he held: the Doctor identified him by the large hands and the cuffs of his black leather coat. Facing Nine, his back to the card game, sat Ten, apparently reading a book. The Doctor recognized the immaculately cut hair, the tan overcoat.

He stood in the center of the room, not sure what to do, contemplating what manner of trap the Papal Mainframe might be setting for him. He watched the card game, grimacing at each flash of familiar facial expression and body language. Encounters with his past selves always brought with them a not-inconsiderable dose of mortification: how could he have dressed like that? How could he have been so arrogant? So buffoonish? So conniving? So bad-tempered? So naïve? It always felt like a funhouse mirror, with the worst aspects of himself reflected back at him. Like most Time Lords, the Doctor tended to feel that his current incarnation was superior to all that had come before it, and the worst part was knowing that his future incarnations would look back at his present self with these same feelings of loathing and chagrin.

The Doctors seated around the table didn't seem to notice the newcomer—or if they did, they were studiously ignoring him. In their corner, Nine and Ten didn't look up from their reading material. The card-players all were drinking, and the Doctor smiled at the predictability of the beverages they'd chosen: white wine for One, ale for Two, cognac for Three, some type of cocktail—a margarita?—for Four, a Bloody Mary for Five (garnished with celery, naturally), port for Six, something that looked suspiciously like soda water for Seven, and claret for Eight. Nine and Ten appeared to be sharing a pot of tea.

A door in the back swung open and in scurried a servant—a waiter?—carrying a tray of fresh drinks for the players. The waiter was small and stooped over, wrapped in a black shroud. When the figure got close enough, the Doctor realized somewhat to his horror that it was the Master, once more a decaying skeletal husk. The Master circled the table, replacing glasses, his demeanor obsequious and fearful. As he handed Four a fresh margarita, the big Time Lord's foot lashed out, kicking the Master and knocking him to the floor. The tray of half-empty glasses fell, smashing to pieces, spilling a fetid brew of spirits across the floor. The eight Doctors chortled with unkind laughter. The Master growled to himself, trying to gather up the mess, but his fleshless fingers couldn't manage the task, and while he fumbled with the shards of glass, Three kicked him again, sending him sprawling and prompting yet more gales of laughter.

"Stop it!" the Doctor yelled, striding into the fracas. "You know what the Time Lords did to him—you should be ashamed of yourselves!"

The laughter died down, and the eight earliest Doctors glared sullenly at their most recent incarnation. The Doctor scooted down, and protecting his right hand with a handkerchief, cleaned up as much of the broken glass as he could before helping the Master to his feet.

"Go," the Doctor told him quietly. "This doesn't concern you—just go."

The Master's face flashed backward through all his various incarnations, until only the child Kosechi remained. Then he vanished.

The first eight Doctors returned to their card game. In the corner, a chair scraped, and Ten got to his feet, folding his glasses and stowing them in an inner pocket of his jacket. He wore the blue suit, the Doctor saw, and he walked with his hands in his pockets, smiling, head tipped at the slight angle that so many had found boyish or charming or irresistible, but which now struck the Doctor as contrived and fatuous.

"Hullo!" said Ten. "The great hero arrives at last." He looked the Doctor up and down, making a disgruntled face at the tatty green coat, the braces, the bow tie. His gaze then came to rest on the Doctor's silvering hair. "Getting a little long in tooth, aren't we?"

The Doctor ignored the banter. "What's your game, then?" he asked. "Bringing me face-to-face with the worst parts of myself, is that it?"

"Oh, we're just getting warmed up," said Ten, and behind his eyes, the Doctor could see a darkness going back into infinity—the scheming consciousness of the Papal Mainframe. He reminded himself that whatever form the Papal Mainframe took in this dreamscape, it wasn't real, only a projection of the Doctor's thoughts and dreams and memories, his own inner turmoil made flesh and given a voice.

"The great Doctor," Ten said, looking the Doctor up and down, getting the measure of him. "I must say, this is an unexpected delight."

"Especially considering you've created an entire religious order dedicated to annihilating me," the Doctor said. "I thought I'd drop by for a chat. Nice work with the NASA spacesuit, by the way, but really, you should've found someone besides my wife to operate the thing."

"Don't think you can defeat us, Doctor," Ten warned, eyes blank, chilling. "Even Time Lords are but a speck of dust to the might of the Papal Mainframe."

The Doctor stepped closer, peering into Ten's eyes, trying to see more. "Do I know you?" he said. "Omega? Rassilon? The Celestial Toymaker? I'd say the Master, but this isn't really his style."

Ten stepped back. "Make no mistake: we will crush you, Doctor."

"So, why haven't you done it already?" the Doctor asked. "You let me get this far." He spun around, examining the drinking den. "You're good, I'll give you that much. This world couldn't be more real. But you're no better than the Silents, aren't you? You need someone else to do your dirty work for you. You couldn't properly kill Tremaine and his people; you had to sow fear and dissent until they ended their own lives. Even this planet is someone else's work. You're all brain and no muscle."

"Don't be too sure of that." Ten took his successor's arm, drawing him toward the beaded curtains. "Have a look backwards, and then tell us how powerless we are."

(ii)

The store-room had vanished, the air clean and very warm beneath the shimmering light of two suns. Around the Doctor waved a sea of long, red grass. Here and there grew tall trees, their trunks black, their leaves silver. In the distance rose the domed roofs of an extensive homestead, and beyond them, the lofty peaks of mist-swathed mountains.

"Gallifrey," the Doctor said, his voice young, adolescent. Not even in his most tormented dreams had it been this beautiful. His chest tightened in a convulsive gasp. Gallifrey, before the war, secure in its place in the cosmos, serene as a goddess, a jewel in the sky.

"Come on, you slug!" a familiar voice called, and a slim figure darted past him. The Doctor gave pursuit, unthinking, chasing after Kosechi, racing through the red grass, which grew tall enough to all but conceal the running boys.

The game ended with the two of them tumbling together, falling into each other's arms beneath the ochre sky. Theta Sigma was only thirteen, but Kosechi was fifteen, his body already becoming more adult, and of late this game had begun to take a turn that Theta Sigma found both exciting and frightening. Catching Theta Sigma's hands in his own, Kosechi pushed his friend onto his back and began kissing him. Theta Sigma still hadn't decided whether he liked this or not, he only knew he was powerless to stop it.

Kosechi paused, gazing down at the younger boy. "You'd let me do anything to you, wouldn't you?"

Trembling, Theta Sigma nodded.

Kosechi leaned down for another kiss, flattening his body against his friend's and holding him immobile. Before the game could go any further, though, a man's voice called: Kosechi's father, who'd been expecting the two boys.

"Later," Kosechi said, his face flushed, blue eyes dilated, almost violet in color. He clambered to his feet, Theta Sigma following. They stole one more prolonged kiss before brushing off their clothes and making their dutiful way to Kosechi's parents' home. His father didn't like to be kept waiting.

(iii)

The Doctor blinked. He stood in the vacant Panopticon, staring at the rows of seats: the lower level and the gallery overhead. The seats were all empty now, no more Time Lords, everything empty and bare.

"Nothing quite as painful as first love, is there?" Ten emerged from the darkness.

The Doctor gave him a look. "Like you'd understand love," he said. "You're an artificial intelligence. Sentient or not, I doubt you've experienced anything close to love, certainly not enough to be an expert on the subject."

"To the contrary," Ten smiled. "I can enter the minds of my acolytes and live vicariously through their bodies."

"A simulation," the Doctor shrugged. "Hardly the real thing—no messy consequences." He looked around the Panopticon. "My former selves—that was mortification. First love—that was grief. Since we're on Gallifrey, I suppose guilt is next. This is all fairly predictable, you know."

Ten's face hardened. "You'll live to regret that flippant tongue of yours."

(iv)

The museum was quiet, deserted, dusty. Theta Sigma wandered among the exhibits, smiling at the old models of time-and-space machines, shaking his head, wondering that any of them had been able to leave Gallifrey and make it back in one piece. The TARDISes all looked rather sad: Time Lords rarely bothered with this collection, preferring the newer, more efficient models. When it came to their time machines, Time Lords didn't look back. Theta Sigma had never actually piloted a TARDIS; his grades in telepathy had been too low to qualify. He'd studied time travel, of course, and had done reasonably well at the theoretical aspects, but his unwillingness to merge his mind with those of other Time Lords had prevented him from passing the practical exams. He liked to come to this part of the museum, though, to daydream about traveling in time and space.

Today he had company, his granddaughter, now a lively four-year-old. Theta Sigma's son and daughter-in-law had gone to attend the induction of Gallifrey's new president, and Theta Sigma, always bored by ceremony, has offered to look after the little girl.

"Mind you don't knock anything over," he said when Shushaneah came a bit too close to a display of fragile old time rotors.

"Yes, Grandfather," she said. Shushaneah wore the tunic and trousers of all Gallifreyan children. She was still in the nursery pods, but in another four years, she'd be able to start her Academy training. Theta Sigma loved her youthful exuberance and spontaneity, her honest emotional responses. He hated the thought of her becoming a Time Lady: cool, aloof, rational. It seemed just moments ago that her father, Theta Sigma's son, had been so young…

Theta Sigma coughed, blinking and turning away. Shushaneah was such a joy. If only there was some way to keep her like this forever. A foolish desire—Shushaneah was a Time Lady; she should be trained as one. Theta Sigma knew full well that once she enrolled at the Academy, his contact with her would be limited. Even his own son would regard Theta Sigma as a bad influence: sentimental, unfocused, unaccomplished, completely lacking in ambition.

"Grandfather, what's this one?" Shushaneah demanded.

"Ah, that looks like an old Type 40," Theta Sigma responded, crossing the exhibition hall, his robes rustling. "In my Academy days, they used these as demonstration models in the time laboratory."

"Do you know how it works?" Shushaneah asked, dark eyes aglow. Apart from her eye color, she looked very much the way Theta Sigma had at the same age—small, slim, her hair dark and undisciplined. Theta Sigma's own hair was turning white now, which disgruntled him; he wasn't even terribly old, barely 200, although of late he'd been cultivating an antediluvian air, mostly as a means of emotional self-preservation.

"Of course I know how it works!" Theta Sigma lied smoothly. He didn't want Shushaneah to regard him as a failure, as everyone else did. Theta Sigma cringed inside, thinking of Kosechi and all the classmates who'd long ago surpassed him; of his parents, their eyes full of so much unspoken disappointment; of his mentors at the Academy, who'd held such high hopes for him. He gazed down at Shushaneah, smiling; at least there was one person on Gallifrey who stood in awe of him.

"Show me!" Shushaneah begged, reaching up to squeeze his hand. "Let's go to another planet!"

"We can't, child," Theta Sigma said. "These are old ships, and besides, the Curator keeps the doors locked."

"This one's unlocked," Shushaneah said, pointing.

Theta Sigma stared. He hadn't noticed—he was sure the door to the smooth, silver pod had been closed when he'd first looked. But Shushaneah was right; the door to the ship stood open, by perhaps a millimeter, almost imperceptible unless one looked very carefully.

"Well," he said, with one quick glance up and down the gallery. Nobody else was about. He coughed. "Well, hmm, yes, of course, let's take a look inside."

He pushed the door open and stepped across the threshold, Shushaneah following behind him, darting eagerly into the console room.

"Oh, Grandfather!" she exclaimed. "It's marvelous!"

Indeed, it was. Theta Sigma turned this way and that, studying the soft, luminous white walls. The machine hummed quietly, an enchanting noise—a surprise to Theta Sigma, as he'd assumed all these old machines must be powered down. But this TARDIS was fully functional. The console was small compared to those of the newer models, but with the same classic hexagonal design, so that six Time Lords could operate it together, joining their minds to each other's and to the ship's matrix. Theta Sigma had never been able to reveal so much of his inner self to anyone, and for that reason, he hadn't been able to pass the practical time-traveling exam. He ventured a hand to stroke the console, gazing at the transparent time rotors.

"The most beautiful thing I've ever known," he said aloud.

"Who are you talking to?" asked Shushaneah, flitting over to his side.

"Hmm? Nobody. Nobody, of course."

"Where are we going?" she asked.

"Aah—well—hmm, how about a little trip to Rheniam and back before the induction ceremony's over?"

"Oh, thank you!" Shushaneah exclaimed.

Theta Sigma circled the console, trying to recall his Academy lessons. Without difficulty, he located the switch that closed the TARDIS doors. He studied the navigation panel, entering the coordinates for Rheniam—at least he hoped those were the coordinates—and pulled the lever to activate the time rotor.

With a grinding noise and a long, sonic whine, the ship began to vibrate. Theta Sigma clung to the console, both hearts racing, his mind filled with a wild excitement. Unauthorized time travel was illegal, of course, strictly prohibited, but with everyone else preoccupied, surely no-one would notice the absence of a museum-piece TARDIS, one unremarkable, undistinguished Time Lord, and a girl too young even to have left the nursery pods.

(v)

He blinked, finding himself in the Panopticon once more.

"One trip," he said out loud. "Just that one little adventure. I was always going to come back. Put the ship in the museum, bring Susan home to her parents."

"But you didn't," said Ten, sprawled in an empty seat, arms and legs akimbo. "You barely knew how to pilot the thing."

The Doctor shrugged. After all these centuries, he still couldn't pilot the TARDIS very well, but that was part of the thrill of his life: improvisation, never quite knowing exactly when or where he was going to go next.

That first tentative adventure had led to another trip, and then another. Theta Sigma had learned, by degrees, to merge his mind with the ship's matrix. While he didn't always go where he planned, or even where he wanted, he always seemed to land where he was needed—and it had taken him centuries, literally, to realize the ship was exercising her own will, taking him places where he'd do the most good—although he'd never set out to be any kind of hero. He'd only wanted to escape the never-ending drone of boredom on Gallifrey—to see new things, to observe life in its infinite multitude of forms.

Early in his travels, he and Shushaneah had found themselves on Earth, the primary cradle of a species so proliferative and successful that it had given its name to an entire phenotype: humanoid. Theta Sigma had been immediately captivated by humanity: enthralled and fascinated and infuriated, all at the same time. Earth had become his second home, and it had been in Edwardian England that he'd adopted the title, "Doctor," an alias at once anonymous and distinguished. He learned that he needed only to introduce himself by this title and people would automatically respect him—or at the very least, they'd give him a moment of their attention. By calling himself the Doctor, he caused people to assume he held some official status, and by the time they thought to question his credentials, he'd either earned their trust or scarpered.

He'd never intended to use the moniker "Doctor" beyond that sojourn on Earth. But on his very next adventure, the title had popped out of his mouth without a second thought, and Theta Sigma had discovered, somewhat to his surprise, that it was an appellation he enjoyed. Many Time Lords adopted a title of distinction, after all, and Theta Sigma found that "Doctor" suited him, as much as the elegant black suit, cloak, and hat he'd taken to wearing. The only trace of his Time Lord identity was his ostentatious amethyst Prydon Academy ring, which he didn't give up wearing until after his first regeneration, when it had no longer fit any of his fingers.

Shushaneah, too, had become changed, her Gallifreyan tunic and trousers exchanged for twentieth century Earth garb. She never questioned why they didn't return home, and over time, the Doctor had concocted a plausible cover story: he and Shushaneah, he would tell people, were exiles, cut off from their own planet and people. Shushaneah grew up in the TARDIS, and between adventures, the Doctor would give her haphazard Academy lessons, but as they traveled it soon became clear that the universe itself was Shushaneah's classroom. During their stay in Edwardian England, the Doctor had transposed her Gallifreyan name to Suzanna, and by the time they returned to Earth in the mid-twentieth century, Suzanna had been shortened to Susan. The Doctor had agreed to let her enroll at the Coal Hill School because she'd wanted to experience ordinary Earth education, and the Doctor had thought it would be a good way to learn more about the culture of this time period.

And then those two inquisitive teachers, Ian and Barbara, had pushed their way into the ship, the first humans to set foot inside the TARDIS. Angered by this intrusion, the Doctor had materialized with the pair on board. And that had been a beginning of another sort, one that had changed the Doctor irrevocably—not merely observing other species, but taking them along with him, showing them the wonders and perils of time and space. If he'd fancied himself a teacher, a wise professor, then the learning had been reciprocal: his friends had taught him, too, the value of kindness and courage and yes, even humility. Everything that was good and noble and selfless about him, he knew he had his friends to thank for. His essential nature, he wasn't too ashamed to admit, was Gallifreyan—cold, unfeeling, selfish, aloof, rational to a fault. It was thanks to his friends, his human companions, that he'd developed any degree of empathy whatsoever.

Ten swung his long legs around, hopping to his feet. "And what about Susan?" he asked, bringing the Doctor back to the present. "Just dumped off on twenty-second century Earth? You never did go back for her."

"I didn't want her to grow up on Gallifrey," the Doctor said. "She'd have become as corrupt as the rest of that lot. I wanted her to be happy. She'd met a young man she loved. I wanted her to experience that, to not be paired off in an arranged marriage, like the rest of us."

"Of course she was happy," Ten scoffed. "Happy until she outlived her husband, their children, even their grandchildren. Happy until generations of people she loved died around her."

"She left Earth," the Doctor said. "I saw her again, on Gallifrey." How that memory hurt. "At Romana's induction as president."

"She returned to Gallifrey because Romana had gone to Earth—looking for you, not incidentally—and found Susan there, three centuries after you'd left her."

The Doctor said, "She didn't resent me for it, if that's what you're hinting around at. If she regretted anything about her life, she kept it to herself."

"Romana encouraged her to regenerate into a child's body again, so she could train at the Academy, a chance you denied her," Ten said.

"Susan made her own decision," the Doctor said. "Nobody forced her."

"And she died on Gallifrey when you destroyed the planet. You murdered her, Doctor. Along with your parents, your son, and the wife you abandoned when you went renegade, all those centuries ago."

"Old news," the Doctor said. "You really think you can flog me about that any more than I've already flogged myself?" He stepped forward, drilling a forefinger into Ten's sternum. "I had two choices: destroy my own people, or let them destroy all of reality, everywhere, at every point in history. A choice I'm sure a cheap hologram like you wouldn't lose a night's sleep over."

Ten glared at him, eyes full of anger, the Papal Mainframe frustrated by its inability to break the Doctor with guilt. Then he smiled, crafty once more, and touched the Doctor's arm.

(vi)

The security guards surrounded him the moment the Doctor set foot outside the TARDIS.

"Oh, heavens, aren't we past this yet?" he asked.

A cool, amused voice ordered, "Boys, you can stand down."

From an inner room, a woman emerged: very tall, slender as a wand, her hair a cascading mass of dark auburn. Her skin was milky white, her eyes deep blue. Her beauty stunned the Doctor, and he stood staring, open-mouthed, until she smiled and said, "Hello, Doctor."

"Romana," he answered, making a short bow. "Your regeneration suits you."

"As does yours," she responded. She said to the guards, "Please leave us."

The commander said, "Lady Romana, this man is a wanted—"

"The Doctor's been pardoned of all his misdemeanors," Romana said. "Or didn't you check your news feeds?" She clucked her tongue. "Now, go."

Palpably disgruntled, the octet of guards swept out of the room.

Romana held out a slim hand. "Doctor," she said. "You received the invitation. I suppose I should consider myself flattered, that you'd return to Gallifrey for my induction."

"This is a visit," the Doctor said. "I'm not staying."

"Of course you're not." Her laughter rippled out like a ribbon of cool water, enchanting him. She slipped a long arm through his, steering him down a curving hallway. Romana wore a simple robe, the garment favored by Time Ladies when they weren't wearing ceremonial garb. The Doctor couldn't help noticing how the white silk draped over Romana's shapely limbs when she moved.

"How did you get out of E-Space?" he asked, trying to distract himself.

"Oh, I built my own TARDIS," she said. "The Tharils helped me."

"And K-9?"

"I left him with Lazlo's great-grandson," Romana said. "The Tharils needed a robot more than I did, once I had an operational TARDIS."

"How long were you in E-Space?" asked the Doctor.

"Centuries," Romana said. "I helped rebuild the Tharil society—got it as stable as it's possible to get any society—and found a weak point in the dimensional wall. I almost destroyed my new TARDIS blasting through, but—"

"Why Gallifrey?" the Doctor asked. "With all of time and space at your disposal? I thought you never wanted to come back."

Her expression wry, Romana said, "I was homesick, Doctor. It can happen to the best of us. When I was in E-Space, I missed Gallifrey so much… more and more, with each passing year." Her arm tightened inside his. "I missed you."

Voice a bit hoarse, the Doctor said, "I missed you as well."

"I gave up looking for you," Romana said, activating a switch in the wall. They stepped into a lift. Brisk and practical once more, she continued, "Everywhere I went, it seemed you'd just left, so I collected Shushanaeh and came home."

Both the Doctor's hearts lurched. "Susan's here?"

"Oh, yes," Romana said. "A student in Prydon Academy, at last."

The Doctor sighed. "All that time I spent trying to keep her away from Time Lord society, and you put her right back into the assembly line."

"Don't worry," Romana smiled. "Shushanaeh won't ever become an unfeeling robot—you had far too much influence over her, not to mention all her years living among humans on Earth. But it's high time she was trained. Even you can't deny her that, Doctor. It's her birthright."

The Doctor squeezed Romana's hand. "Look after her, would you?"

"Of course," Romana said. "She's hardly neglected—your father was especially pleased to see her come home. Shushanaeh stays with him and your mother during the Academy holidays."

"My parents?" The Doctor's hearts again gave an uncomfortable thud. "How are they?"

"They're well," said Romana. "But they miss you. I'd pay them a visit, if I were you."

The Doctor dragged his feet. "I suppose," he grumbled.

"Indeed," Romana smiled. "Really—it's been centuries, Doctor. The Daleks see more of you than your own parents."

"All right, all right," the Doctor said. The doors to the lift swooshed open, and he glanced around. "Top floor," he said. "The president's apartments?"

"I've had them remodeled," Romana said. "It was about ten centuries overdue. What do you think?"

From this vantage point, in a high tower overlooking the Citadel, one could see the entire city, secure beneath its glass dome, tinted now to ward off the scorching summer heat from Gallifrey's two suns. The tint would fade after the suns set, allowing one to see the other stars in the constellation of Kasterborous.

The Doctor circled the viewing platform, not hurrying. As much as he hated the cold arrogance of the Time Lords, he loved Gallifrey, loved its natural splendor. The windows here extended from ceiling to floor, and the panorama took his breath away.

"Remarkable," he said after they'd made the full circuit. Around the inner walls were arrayed pieces of artwork that Romana had collected from all over time and space. The Doctor pointed to one with a scolding finger.

"That's a Vermeer—The Concert," he said. "You stole that?"

"Borrowed it," Romana smiled. "Well, liberated it, actually. It looks better on my wall than it did on Whitey Bulger's."

"You're shameless," the Doctor laughed.

She squeezed his hand again. "I learned that from you." Romana paused before a doorway and pressed a button set into the control panel. "Come see the rest."

An inner corridor led to a courtyard, a hidden garden filled with trees and flowers. Ferns and irises grew along the banks of an artificial brook that wound its musical way through the grove. The Doctor walked the paths, still arm-in-arm with Romana, utterly bewitched, inhaling the scents of earth and flowers and the tangy herbs planted in beds.

"Remarkable," he said at last, keeping his voice low to avoid breaking the spell. "I'll bet old Borusa didn't plant this."

"No, the outgoing president had it filled with books—he's a history enthusiast, and I swear he had every volume of the Ancient Chronicles—he must be an insomniac. This is mine. I wanted a sanctuary, a place of tranquility."

The Doctor glanced up at the sky, then around the grove again. "You modeled this on the TARDIS cloisters," he said.

"You're slipping," Romana smiled, her fingertips tracing along the inside of his wrist. "It's taken you, what, twenty minutes to realize that?"

Indeed it had. The Doctor realized he was distracted—by Romana, by her unexpected new beauty, by the sheer joy of seeing her once again.

"I've missed you," he said. "So much. I've never stopped thinking about you." He reached out a tentative hand, caressing a strand of her glossy hair.

"After brunette and blonde, I decided to go ginger this time," Romana responded. Her fingers strayed up to the Doctor's habitually untidy hair, tracing his prominent cowlick. "You've got a bit of a red patina yourself, there," she said.

"It was quite by accident," he said. "Got caught in the crossfire of gang warfare in San Francisco." His nose wrinkled. "Not pleasant, especially when they tried to defibrillate me in hospital. I didn't have time to worry about cosmetics."

Romana said, "I'm sorry I wasn't there to help."

Their faces were very close—Romana was almost the Doctor's height—and he took advantage of the moment to lean in for a kiss.

"You devil," she smiled. "You haven't changed that much."

"Nor you."

Romana took his hand, leading him from the garden to an inner room of her apartments. A row of small windows looked out onto the viewing platform. This was an anteroom, where Romana would receive visitors and conduct official business. From there, she led the Doctor deeper inside the suite.

Gallifreyan homes, large or small, urban or rural, tended to be built around the same general scheme. Husbands and wives most always had separate rooms for sleeping, with a room connecting the two for sexual activity. While the sleeping rooms might sometimes have one small window, the rooms designated for sex were always the most internal rooms of the home, completely windowless, only accessible by the two sleeping rooms.

Many of the Doctor's companions, if they'd given any thought to the matter at all, had assumed him either celibate or otherwise disinterested in sex. Time Lords weren't prudish, but they tended on the whole to be very private when it came to amorous matters. Their marriages were arranged, but because Time Lords lived for so long, they took lovers as a matter of course; fidelity to one's spouse wasn't required, either by custom or by law. Since they could change gender when they regenerated, many Time Lords had no real sexual preference. The Doctor had had no wish—yet, anyway—to experience life in a woman's body. On the other hand, if he ever could turn out looking like Romana, he might be tempted to give it a try.

Smiling, she led him to the innermost room, closing the door behind them and setting the lock.

"All right?" she inquired.

The Doctor nodded, suddenly nervous, dumbstruck, and shy.

The lighting in here was very soft and diffuse, the walls painted a rich purple. Underfoot, the carpet was plush and dove gray. The large bed had been draped with fabric of the same colors, accented with pillows and cushions in deep green. One end of the bed was raised, creating a platform.

Romana turned her back to the Doctor, and he enfolded her in his arms, kissing her hair and the back of her neck, his long hands roaming up and down her body, learning her new contours. Romana arched into him, her noises of pleasure telling him he remembered well what she enjoyed.

They drew apart long enough to disrobe, the Doctor's garments falling away one by one. He unfastened the hooks on the back of Romana's gown, and the white silk fluttered to the floor, joining the Doctor's clothes. Beneath the robe, Romana was scandalously naked. She laughed at the Doctor's expression, leading him by the hand to the bed. They nuzzled and kissed and caressed each other, and finally, Romana ran her knuckles under the Doctor's cheekbones, pressing down firmly. He did the same for her, trembling slightly.

A moment later, the scent of their musk filled the air around them, and the familiar, instantaneous arousal followed. Romana clambered up to her knees, leaning against the raised platform. The Doctor mounted her from behind and took her without hesitation. She moaned softly, pushing back against him, and they moved together, the lost centuries but the blink of an eye. Yesterday—it might have been yesterday—and that was the last coherent thought to cross the Doctor's mind.

(vii)

The musk took a few hours to wear off, and under its spell, they coupled again and again. Hunger followed—Romana had anticipated this need as well, providing them with a sensuous feast of Gallifreyan delicacies. And wine—from the planet's best vineyards, centuries old, the flavors distinct, mellow and clear, a symphony of pleasure on the tongue.

"Has there been anyone else?" asked Romana, catching the Doctor off guard.

"Why?" he asked. "Would you be jealous if I said yes?"

Romana laughed low in her throat, running her long fingers over his chest. "Hardly," she said. "I'm just curious. You acted like it had been a while."

"No," he said. "There's been no one since you."

She clicked her tongue. "I'm sorry," she said. "You shouldn't have to be alone."

"Who says I've been alone?" he huffed. "I've had loads of friends traveling with me."

"That's not what I meant," she chided.

"There wasn't anyone who could hold a candle to you," the Doctor said.

"No humans?" asked Romana.

The Doctor went rigid all over. "No," he said, unable to stop an involuntary flinch of distaste. "What makes you ever think I'd—no, absolutely not. Humans are—they're children, Romana. It wouldn't be right."

"I just wondered how much moral conditioning you've been able to overcome."

"Some Time Lord strictures are in place for a good reason," the Doctor said. He swallowed some wine. "Besides, a hybrid species? We have no idea how dangerous that could be." He had to admit, he'd been very fond of several human friends, but he'd never let things progress beyond warm affection; one snog with Grace Holloway was as far as he'd been willing to go. "That's not why I want people to travel with me," he heard himself saying. "I'd never want anyone to think I'd invited them along in exchange for—for—favors."

"Hmm. That's quite noble of you," Romana said. "Not everyone would be so scrupulous."

Stricken by a sudden flash of insight, the Doctor said, "You—did you—?" He couldn't finish the sentence.

Romana gave him a long, level stare. "Would it make a difference?" she asked.

"In how I feel about you?"

"In what you think of me."

The Doctor tried to repress a swell of revulsion and the urge to be judgmental. "Does anyone else know?"

"Anyone on Gallifrey, you mean? No."

"You'd best keep it that way," the Doctor said. "It would be enough to discredit your candidacy."

"Anyone who would know is in E-Space," Romana said.

"Was it—?" the Doctor said. "Not—a Tharil?"

"Lazlo's son," Romana said. "I know you disapprove, Doctor. You're too transparent."

"Why are you telling me this?" the Doctor asked. "Not a need to confess, surely?"

"Perhaps I'd feel less… troubled about it, if I knew you'd had a similar experience."

"Hoping to dilute the guilt a bit?" the Doctor asked.

"I don't feel guilty!" Romana flared. "I loved him! He was—" She struggled for words.

In a flash of understanding, the Doctor said, "He died?"

She nodded mutely, eyes brimming. "He lived to be over two hundred, but that's nothing to us. I knew it would happen, but still, nothing prepares you for that pain—that horrible sense of emptiness."

Misgivings forgotten, the Doctor drew her into his arms. "I'm so sorry, Romana." He stroked her long hair, then asked, "Is that why you left E-Space?"

She nodded. "Yes—it became too unbearable—to go alone to the places I'd been with him—it didn't seem right without him there."

"Yes—yes, I know." The Doctor closed his eyes, remembering those first days after Romana had left the TARDIS, when nothing had seemed to matter very much. Regeneration had come almost as a relief—in his new body, his desire for Romana had been muted, less acute, a more diffuse melancholy.

"Is that why you looked for me?" the Doctor asked. "Came back here?"

"It was silly—I wanted to see someone who loved me—and go somewhere he could never have gone. I even regenerated to try to ease the pain."

"Well, there's a pair of us," the Doctor murmured. "Did it work?"

Romana kissed him. "It wasn't a complete cure, but it helped." After another kiss, she said, "And so does this." She drew him down to the cushions and their bodies slid together.

"The cure for everything?" the Doctor teased.

Romana agreed, "Close enough."

(viii)

The robes—he'd forgotten how voluminous they were, the scarlet and orange silk of Prydon Academy. The helmet—tight-fitting on the head—too close, too uncomfortable, and his hair stuck out ridiculously beneath it. And the heavy scapular, worst of all—an insistent weight on the shoulders, forcing one to adopt that rigid, unyielding Time Lord posture. It had taken years for the Doctor finally to relax his stance, but even now, under duress, his head would go up, shoulders back, spine ramrod straight, as if drawing on the power and authority of his species.

The robes weren't his—Romana had loaned him a set—the Doctor's last set of regalia was buried in a trunk inside the TARDIS, now far too small for him. Twitching, he waited among the other Prydonians, none of whom he recognized. They all knew him, of course, and they kept a distasteful distance from the notorious renegade, stealing covert, scornful glares from the corners of their eyes.

The sea of red robes parted slightly, and a Time Lord, tall even by the standards of their people, came forward, a beautiful Time Lady at his side. The Doctor gawked. He would know this man anywhere—his own father. Now he could see where the looks of his fourth incarnation had come from. The protuberant dark blue eyes, the prominent nose, the curly hair—white now, but it had been brown when the Doctor had seen him last.

"Lord Theta Sigma," said Tanicus, his tone somber, offering a hand. Time Lords never embraced one another in public—it was considered gauche in the extreme, overemotional, grotesque. Tanicus even sounded the same, his voice deep and authoritative.

"Father," said the Doctor with a formal half-bow, hating that his manners reverted to Gallifreyan so quickly. He tried not to let it bother him that his father addressed him as "Lord." "And Mother." He reached out to clasp hands with Lady Azadeh. He could see in her coloring the complexion of his fifth and sixth incarnations—fair, like peaches or apricots. Her hair had once been fine and gold, but now was pure white. "How are you both?"

"Well," replied Tanicus. "And yourself?"

"Very well," the Doctor said. "Romana told me—"

"Lady Romanadvoratrelundar," his mother corrected him.

The Doctor tried not to flush. Time Lords prefixed their names with Lord or Lady—only family members or lovers would use the familiar form, and even then, not in public.

"I've been away too long," the Doctor said, covering his faux pas as smoothly as possible. "Lady Romana told me Susan's been staying with you on her holidays."

"Her parents are conducting field research in Ulovspinnel," said Tanicus, referring to a small continent near Gallifrey's north pole. "They asked us to look after Shushanaeh."

The thought of his son caused the Doctor no small amount of pain. From young adulthood, Gaderian had wanted very little to do with his embarrassing father; now, of course, he hated the Doctor for kidnapping Susan and leaving her on Earth among humans for so long.

Lady Azadeh said, "Will you visit with him while you're home?"

"If he'll even speak to me," the Doctor said. He supposed they'd next be admonishing him to go patch things up with his wife.

"You should at least try," his mother chided.

The Doctor make a noncommittal grunting noise. He'd come home for Romana's induction, not to waste time groveling for the approval of people who loathed the very sight of him, who considered him no better than the Master or the Rani or any of Gallifrey's other criminals. Tanicus and Azadeh at least maintained a modicum of sympathy—they themselves were iconoclasts of sorts, dwelling outside mainstream Time Lord society in the splendid isolation of their mountainside home. This was probably their first trip to the Citadel in decades; the Doctor suspected Romana had alerted them to their wayward son's arrival.

From deep within the Panopticon, a series of chimes sounded. The Prydonians grew quiet and organized themselves into serried ranks. The procession was about to begin.

(xiv)

The children sat around tables in the common area. A hum of industry and purpose hovered over the small figures, who worked in pairs and groups, quizzing each other. These were primary-level students, but the collars and cuffs of their tunics identified them as a more advanced cohort—Primary Two. In a few years, they would progress to Primary Three, and from there to the intermediate level. They would move through Secondary in three similar stages, and then to Tertiary. After completing the Tertiary Three exams, they'd earn the title Tertiary Oblate and spend the next five years in one intense area of specialization. When this study was satisfactorily completed, the young scholars would be titled Time Lord Novice, and after passing the final battery of theoretical and practical exams, would be awarded the coveted rank of Time Lord. The entire grueling process could take a total of four or five decades.

Today, the students were memorizing the properties of all the stars, planets, moons, and asteroids that comprised the vast Ophichus Supercluster. The Doctor could call that information to mind without effort—a skill these youngsters would one day acquire, the ability to store information deep in the mind and recall it at will.

He scanned the tables, allowing his telepathic sense to flow out. There. At the far table, clearly leading the study session, sat a girl who appeared to the naïve eye about eleven years old. She was slim, elfin, her face long and almost pointed, framed with waves of red-gold hair. Her eyes were wide and aquamarine in color, and they grew even wider when she looked up, startled by the telepathic nudge, and saw the Doctor. Excusing herself to her companions, she stood, rising to her feet with a smooth, fluid movement.

The Doctor turned and left the common room, preferring to have this reunion in private. The girl followed him to an unoccupied lecture hall. The low seats were arranged in a circle, so that students could have an unobstructed view of their tutors. From a computer set into the floor, images of everything from solar systems to complex equations to DNA molecules could be projected in three dimensions. The Doctor felt an unexpected pang of nostalgia for his student days, time spent in classrooms very like this one, listening to the drone of his professors, the eager replies of his classmates. He'd wondered so often how they could be so ambitious when he could barely stay awake during lecture.

"Grandfather?"

The sound of her voice—bright and lovely, like a silver bell—prompted the Doctor to spin about. She took in the ceremonial regalia and burst out laughing.

With a shout of happiness, the Doctor swept her into his arms. He lifted her off her feet and swung her about.

"Susan!" he laughed.

"Oh, Grandfather, it's so good to see you again! Are you coming home, too?"

The question touched him with its absurd innocence. Blinking and clearing his throat, the Doctor said, "No. I'm sorry, child. But I'll visit more often, I promise." He set his granddaughter on her feet.

Susan gazed up at him, her expression of adoration completely undiminished. "No, you won't." She was teasing, but he could sense the sadness behind her words.

He gently disentangled himself from her arms and removed the heavy scapular, setting it down with a grimace. The helmet followed. "There," he sighed. "Much better."

"You only came back for Lady Romana's induction?" asked Susan.

"Yes," the Doctor said. "You know me too well, Susan. I've never been happy here." They sat on the lecturer's desk, an impertinence—students were prohibited from sitting anywhere but their own seats. Susan, with glee, drew up her feet and sat cross-legged. "As soon as the festivities are over, I'll be off again." He reached out and brushed an affectionate finger down the bridge of her perfect nose, thrilled that she'd turned out such a beauty—Romana's doing, no doubt. "But enough about an old man—how are you liking the Academy?"

"It's all right," she said. "Sometimes fun, sometimes interesting, sometimes dull. The other students are so young, Grandfather. I've had great-grandchildren, and most of the students seem like they've barely left the nursery pods." Her wonderful laughter pealed out. "I've been to some of the planets we're studying, and I can tell them stories—the Daleks and the Sensorites and the Voord. The professors get so cross when I talk about you, Grandfather."

"I would imagine so," the Doctor said dryly. "I'm hardly anyone's idea of a model Time Lord."

"But the children love the stories about you," Susan confided.

"And then they'll become indoctrinated and start hating me," the Doctor said.

"They're only jealous," Susan told him. "The other Time Lords all resent you for your freedom."

"Susan—ah, how did you and David, erm, how did you have children?" the Doctor asked awkwardly. "It's not possible—Gallifreyans and humans—the genetics—completely incompatible—"

Susan stared at him, then burst again into merry laughter. "Silly Grandfather! We adopted children, of course. There were so many orphans after the Daleks invaded Earth. David and I adopted four."

The Doctor exhaled, wondering how he could not have deduced something so obvious. "Oh," he said. "Oh—yes, I see." He took Susan's hand. "I'm so sorry I never went back to visit you."

"It's all right," she said. "I was happy on Earth—David and I had such a wonderful life together."

"It was selfish of me," the Doctor said. "I wasn't thinking of how you would outlive him."

"I wouldn't trade it for anything," Susan told him. "No matter how sad I was when he died." Her voice trembled. "You were right to make me leave the TARDIS—I never would have left you of my own volition."

"I wanted you to be happy," he said, "and not spend the rest of your life trailing about after a daft old man." He glanced around the classroom and sighed. "I wanted to spare you all this." He lowered his voice. "Time Lords are so corrupt, Susan. Maybe things will change now that Romana's president, but centuries of unlimited power have rotted our species. Be very careful who you trust, who you confide in. Time Lords are as back-stabbing a lot as you'll ever meet."

She nodded. It was uncanny that someone who appeared so childish could also appear so wise. The Doctor had to remind himself that Susan wasn't some naïve girl; she was over three hundred years old—a full century older than he had been when he'd first left Gallifrey.

"I'll take care, Grandfather," she promised him.

They heard a voice outside the classroom, a young man announcing that the study session was coming to an end.

"That's Lord Prasutagus," said Susan. "He's the Associate Provost for the primary students. I'd better leave—we have a two-hour tutorial before dinner."

"No holiday for the president's induction?" the Doctor joked, swinging down off the lecturer's desk and lifting Susan by the waist, placing her on her feet.

"We're at liberty tonight after dinner," said Susan. "We're excused from evening study period."

"So hedonistic," the Doctor mocked, making an exaggerated expression of disapproval. "Next thing you know, the student body will be up in arms, demanding a more colorful tunic."

Susan gave him a little jab in the ribs with her elbow. "Don't be impertinent, Grandfather."

"I wouldn't dream of it," he smiled, scooping up his borrowed helmet and scapular. "I'll look in on you again when you're Lady Shushanaeh, and you have to wear one of these wretched things."

"I'll build my own TARDIS and come find you," Susan promised, hugging him. "We'll have adventures again, and I'll help you upgrade your old Type 40."

He blinked away more ridiculous tears. "I'm looking forward to it." He could hear Lord Prasutagus rounding up the stragglers, so he said, "Go on now, before you get into as much trouble as me."

Giggling, Susan hurried from the room.

(x)

"Oh, my," said Ten. "Are those tears I see?"

The Doctor dabbed at his wet face. "If the alternative is to be an unfeeling machine like you, I'll take my tears, gladly." They were back in the empty Panopticon once more. How different it had looked at Romana's induction ceremony—full of light and music and colorfully-robed Time Lords. The Doctor had been foolish enough to believe the planet might enter a new era of enlightenment with Romana at the head of the High Council. Instead, Gallifrey had only been plunged into a futile, unwinnable war, and then, the ultimate darkness of oblivion.

"Two people you loved more than anything," Ten said. "Both dead by your own hand."

"You haven't done your homework," the Doctor said. "Susan and Romana were both murdered by Daleks. If you were as good as you think you are, you'd have plumbed that little nugget from my memory."

"You failed to save them," said Ten.

"That's not the same thing," the Doctor countered. "Susan died trying to protect the children in the Academy." This knowledge had provided the Doctor's only source of solace, that Susan had died fighting. But even now, the deaths of the children in the Academy haunted the Doctor more than any of the other atrocities of the Time War. How ruthless and brilliant of the Daleks, to strike down the very future of Time Lord society. He hated those evil things, hated them with a ferocity that still burned like a supernova at the very core of his being.

He was grateful, though, for that last trip home—the most enjoyable visit to Gallifrey since he'd gone renegade. He'd spent time with Susan, he'd made a nostalgic trip to his childhood home and visited his parents in privacy, and he'd passed several long, languid days in Romana's company in the Citadel. When he'd left the planet at last, he'd assured her that he would in fact return again. Now that he was pardoned of his crimes, he could come and go on Gallifrey as he pleased, and he promised Susan as well that he would come home periodically to look in on her. He'd left the planet feeling happy and at peace. But the next time Romana had summoned him home, it had been a frantic plea for help—a massive-scale war had broken out, and Gallifrey had been under siege by a Dalek battle fleet.

"No," said the Doctor, "no, not again—" But it was too late; Ten smiled an evil, gloating smile, and the Doctor's mind spun into darkness once more.

(xi)

The heat of battle gave no time to think or reflect or mourn the dead. The Doctor was pinned, trapped by the same sextet of Daleks that had murdered Romana. Her body lay in the corridor outside the niche where he hid. Rage boiled inside the Doctor, but he forced himself to remain calm. He would not allow those monsters to defile her body.

He glanced all around, wild eyes darting from side to side. There—a tiny hatch in the wall. The Doctor opened it with his sonic screwdriver and detached a pair of reserve conduits, devices that stored and transmitted power from the Eye of Harmony up through the Citadel. Benign things, but with a bit of tweaking—

He shot out of his hiding spot and across the intersection of two corridors, dodging electric blasts from the Daleks, weaving back and forth to draw their fire. He had to keep them away from Romana's body. His speed and agility, not to mention his intimate knowledge of the layout of the Citadel, bought him critical moments, and he reached the first-floor atrium with only his long coat scorched. The power had been cut, but using his sonic screwdriver and some of the reserve energy stored in one conduit, he was able to get the lift working. He opened and closed the doors, sending the empty lift up to the fifteenth floor. He knew the Daleks would not miss that tell-tale thump. Faster than lightning, he threw himself behind a nearby collection of potted ornamental topiary.

The six Daleks rolled silently into the atrium. "The Doc-tor has es-caped in the lift," the leader droned, placing its black suction cup against the control panel. "You two will stay and guard the ap-proach. He must be found and ex-term-in-a-ted."

The other two Daleks chorused, "I obey."

When the doors to the lift opened, the first four Daleks rolled inside and the doors closed. The Doctor waited until the lift began rising, then he aimed the sonic screwdriver at a wall opposite the two Dalek sentries, causing a mounted blown-glass sculpture to shatter with a loud explosion. As he expected, their eyestalks swiveled around to the source of the noise. The Doctor rolled one of the energy conduits along the floor, then flung himself onto his belly, covering his head with both hands. The Daleks whipped around, instinctively firing at the small white canister.

With a deafening blast, the conduit, supercharged from the twin energy blasts, exploded, blowing the Daleks' casings wide open. In an instant, the Doctor was on top of the nearest one, ripping its blaster out of the metal shell. The two mutant Kaleds were alive but wounded, naked and exposed. The Doctor turned the energy blaster on first one, then the second, splattering scorched pieces of fleshy tentacles all over the atrium.

He turned then to the lift: still ascending. The Doctor used the sonic screwdriver to stop the lift, jamming it in place between the thirteenth and fourteenth floors, and employing all his strength, he forced open the lift doors. He tossed the second conduit into the base of the shaft, aimed the Dalek's blaster and fired, then threw himself out of harm's way, letting the titanium-alloy doors snap shut.

The elevator shaft channeled the force of the blast upward, and a moment later came the sound of something large and heavy hurtling down the shaft and smashing. The Doctor waited a moment, then re-opened the doors.

The three surviving mutants were trying desperately to escape the scorched wreckage of their casings. One had been blinded. "Doc-tor… Doc-tor," another one grated—even in debilitating pain, still trying to destroy its most hated enemy.

"Look at you lot," the Doctor said, his laughter harsh, even to his own ears. "Without your little metal tanks, you're just soft-bodied mollusks, aren't you?" A tentacle flailed out at him. Nimbly side-stepping its reach, the Doctor said, "I'd take a moment to savor the irony of killing you with your own weapon, but you haven't left me much time. But know this, Daleks: I will cross all of time and space and wipe every last one of you from existence." With that, he pointed the blaster into the mass of tentacles and fired the weapon until the air around him reeked with the stench of burning flesh.

(xii)

Romana's body lay where it had fallen. She'd taken a blast directly to both hearts; there would be no regeneration, no miracle, no resurrection. She already was growing cold, though the core of her body retained a tantalizing warmth. The Doctor lifted her into his arms and staggered toward the president's private lift, which operated on an isolated power grid, fed by solar panels on the roof of the tower. Romana had taught the Doctor the telepathic passkey that would open the doors, and he used it now, slipping inside and pressing the control panel for the topmost floor.

The lift doors opened to the penthouse, remarkably undamaged, untouched by the savage war that had engulfed the planet. Outside the Citadel, the meadows and forests of Gallifrey burned. Dalek battleships lay in smoking, broken hulks where they had landed, shot down by Gallifreyan defense forces. The Doctor ignored the carnage, turning into the president's apartments, carrying Romana to the replica of the TARDIS cloisters. He'd come back later, if he survived, if there was time, and properly burn her body, but for now, he wanted her hidden where the Daleks could not desecrate what was left of her.

He lay her down on a bed of moss, listening to the forlorn trickle of water through the garden. As he folded her arms across her breast, the sleeve of her robe fell back a bit, exposing the inside of her left arm. On the smooth white skin she'd tattooed a mark in black ink: two letters, one atop the other, like a logo of some sort. But they weren't the circular characters of the Gallifreyan alphabet. They were from Earth, letters from the Latin alphabet: an I, sitting atop a letter M.

Stunned, the Doctor just knelt there, staring at the mark. Romana would not have put those letters there, made them a permanent part of her being, without good reason. That the letters were from Earth told the Doctor this was some kind of message for him. He switched the two letters back and forth, wondering what they meant. I am? Am I? Were they an acronym, like UNIT? Did the I stand for intelligence or international, the M for military?

No, that was ridiculous—Romana was far more subtle than that. The Doctor forced himself to study her arm again, noticing not the letters, but their shape—their font, as Earth typesetters might have said. The lettering looked archaic, almost as if it had been done by hand. The Doctor realized he'd seen that handwriting before—those very same letters—a symbol, an identification mark—but where?

With a yelp of realization, he sprang up to his feet, regarding Romana's dead, peaceful face, framed by waves of crimson hair. "You genius," he breathed, sprinting from the garden and out to the observation platform. There—on the wall—the painting of The Concert. The mark on Romana's arm was not two letters but three: the I sat in the middle of a V formed by the two peaks of the letter M, creating a monogram: IVM.

"Only it's not an I, it's a J," the Doctor said out loud, lifting the painting from its hook. "Johannes Vermeer—that was one way he signed his initials." His fingertips ran lightly across the picture. "This is a reproduction—she already returned the original to Earth." Where the picture had been was a tiny hole, almost indistinguishable from the pattern on the fabric wall covering. The Doctor peered into the hole, but saw nothing. He inserted the tip of his small finger and felt something cool and smooth. Glass.

The Doctor aimed the sonic screwdriver at the hole, trying one setting, than another. Without warning, a beam of light shot out from the glass lens, and a life-sized hologram of Romana appeared beside the Doctor, so real he almost cried out in shock.

"Congratulations," she smiled, looking not at him but at some unseen recording device. "I'm guessing you solved my little riddle, Doctor. This message is for you. If you're listening to it now, I'm probably dead." Her composure hadn't rattled as she'd spoken. "In which case, the Time Lords are losing the war. And it's important that you listen carefully to this message, Doctor, and follow my instructions."

"Oh, Romana," he whispered.

"Time Lord technology must never fall into the Daleks' hands—well, they don't have hands—but you understand what I mean, Doctor. They must never acquire Gallifreyan time travel technology. They'd destroy all of creation, everywhere, at every point in time, in every universe. If life is to continue in any form at all, the Time Lords' knowledge must be destroyed. And you know there's only one way to do that."

"No," said the Doctor. "Oh, no. Please, Romana. Don't make me do this."

"The telepathic passkey to the president's suite also opens a safe in the floor of my anteroom," Romana went on. "Inside the safe is a doomsday weapon, Doctor, a bomb capable of destroying a planet. If it becomes evident that the Daleks are winning the war, Doctor, you must use the bomb to destroy Gallifrey."

The Doctor stood staring at the hologram, wondering how Romana could have thought through this unspeakable scenario with such cool logic.

"The bomb needs to be detonated inside the Eye of Harmony," Romana went on. "Only the president can open the Eye. You need three things: the seal of the president, the handprint of the president, and the passkey. You know the passkey. The president's seal is in the safe, along with the bomb. And I've left you a glove of synthetic skin, which contains a perfect replica of my handprint and my genetic code. You must go down to the Eye of Harmony, underneath the Panopticon. If you can't use the lift to get down there, find the old maintenance shafts. Not all of them have been sealed off, and any one will take you to the Eye."

Romana concluded, "Doctor, I'm sorry to have to burden you with this. If by some miracle you're able to escape the war and the destruction of the planet, please forgive me. If I live, I'll gladly take on this burden myself. But if I don't live, you're the only one I know I can trust to do the right thing."

She sighed, her shoulders rising and falling. "Doctor, if I'm dead, you might look into the movements of Lord Prasutagus—he's been behaving oddly, and I don't trust him."

Lord Prasutagus. The young Time Lord responsible for Susan's cohort at the Academy…

Softly, Romana said, "My dear Doctor. I owe you so much—my life, my freedom, the ability to think for myself. Thanks to you, I know what it truly means to be a Time Lady—and a woman. I hope you never need to hear this message, but if you're listening now, know that I loved you beyond what I ever could have imagined. I'm so, so sorry to have to ask this of you. Goodbye."

And the hologram flickered into blue static before vanishing completely.

The Doctor stood staring at the spot where she had been, as if he could somehow will her to return with only his eyes, too numb even for tears.

A searing flash of light outside the Citadel nearly blinded him, and a series of explosions rocked the city, causing the tower to sway back and forth. The Doctor threw himself to the floor and waited, shaking with fear, until the structure settled back onto its foundation. There was no telling how much longer the building would survive the onslaught. The Doctor raced into Romana's anteroom, his legs like rubber; he needed to remove the contents from her safe while the tower still stood.

(xiii)

When he opened his eyes in the empty Panopticon, he was lying facedown on the cold floor, his breathing harsh and ragged: he'd been sobbing in his trance. Romana. If he reached back into the right corner of his memory, he could recall exactly her taste, her scent, the texture of her skin and hair, the sound of her voice, a memory as potent as perfume or song.

He didn't stand. Somewhere in the shadows of the Panopticon, Ten paced. The Doctor could hear the whisper of his rubber-soled feet on the marble floor, feel the faint cool breeze stirred by the movement of the long, tan coat. The Papal Mainframe was like a leopard, stalking its wounded prey, waiting to make the final, lethal strike. Right now the Doctor was still too strong, still a danger. He would need to be further weakened before the Papal Mainframe would deliver the coup de grâce.

The ultimate irony of the Time War was that the Doctor had destroyed Gallifrey not to protect all creation from the Daleks, but from the Time Lords. Unable to bear the thought of their own demise, the Time Lords had sought to destroy all reality in order to preserve an existence as disembodied entities, leaving the Doctor to face the most agonizing decision of his life.

Any hesitation that might have kept the Doctor from taking that final, dreadful step had dissolved when he'd discovered the truth in Romana's message: Lord Prasutagus had betrayed her to the Daleks. The same cabal of Time Lords that had resurrected the Master had known Romana would never countenance their next desperate scheme: to resurrect Rassilon, the most brilliant, devious, and corrupt of their species. Romana had to die, but in a way that made her seem like another casualty of the war…

The Doctor remembered too well his rage at Lord Prasutagus. He might have murdered the traitor himself, but he'd stayed his hand, and in the end, Lord Prasutagus had been shot down by a Dalek—a fitting end for such a treasonous devil. It was Lord Prasutagus, too, who had given the Daleks access to the Academy, allowing them to wipe out the future of the Time Lords. The Doctor only wished Lord Prasutagus had lived long enough to be trapped forever in the vicious time loop of unending death: Susan and Romana both had been spared that horror, but so, alas, had their murderer.

"I can't have it all," the Doctor said to himself. "Not even I can arrange everything the way I want it to be, death least of all."

"Damn straight," said Ten, his hand like ice on the Doctor's shoulder.

(xiv)

Warmth and darkness. Not pitch blackness, but a pleasant dimness—pale daylight filtered by blinds and curtains. A soft, cocooning warmth in which he could have floated almost indefinitely. He was lying in a bed—a lovely bed: firm and supportive, yet plush and yielding, the kind of bed in which all the kinks of one's spine would release, one by one. Even the pillow beneath his head felt marvelous. He stretched each muscle, then turned onto his other side. And froze.

Beside him, curled up and sleeping, lay a female figure. The Doctor blinked, pushing himself onto his elbow, inhaling a pungent, musky scent—a miasma of sweat and vanilla, shot through with a sharp jab of expensive perfume—a dot behind each ear, another behind the knees. How did he know that? How did he know exactly where this woman would dab her perfume? He stared at her head, at the spill of wheat-blonde hair across the pillowcase.

The Doctor turned his gaze to the room, whose contours became clearer as the light outside the windows grew more insistent. Was I dreaming? He must have been—but he couldn't remember anything from before he'd fallen asleep, only a vague sense of disquiet, a sense of something amiss that he couldn't quite pinpoint. The more he tried to focus, the more elusive it became.

The limitations of the human mind, he thought, then jolted. Human? He was a Time Lord—why should he imagine he was human? The Doctor put a hand to his chest, feeling for the familiar thudding. Lub-dup, lub-dup. One heart. Only one. He was human.

Stunned, he sat straight up. When had this happened? An unplanned accident with the chameleon arch? No, in that case he wouldn't be able to remember anything, and the Doctor could remember quite clearly that he was a Time Lord.

Daylight had revealed the room as modest in size but pleasingly proportioned, with tall windows, tasteful wallpaper, and plush carpeting. The Doctor's hand reached out to stroke the coverlet, which was made of some heavy, slubby material, like silk. Not far from the bed sat a chair, a man's clothing strewn over it, as if he'd disrobed in a hurry. Mixed among the shirt and trousers, the jacket and necktie, he spotted a woman's clothing: a short skirt, a bright blue knitted top, crumpled black stockings, knickers, and a bra.

The Doctor realized that beneath the sensuously luxurious sheets, he was naked as the day he'd been born. A hot blush swept up his face. What was he doing here? Wherever "here" was—?

Beside him, the woman rolled over and sat upright, the covers sliding down over her bare torso, exposing lovely round breasts tipped with pale pink nipples.

"Morning," she smiled. "Happy Christmas."

"Rose?" he said stupidly.

She laughed, "You always look so surprised." But when she angled in for a kiss, he drew away. "What?" she asked.

"I—Rose? It's really you?"

"Yeah!" She held up her left hand, an extravagant diamond visible even in the low light.

The Doctor looked down at his own right hand, at the ring of gold on his third finger. "We're married?"

"Mmm-hmm," she said, snuggling into his side. "Soon as we got home from Norway, remember? Right here in the garden—Mum did all the decorating—don't you remember?"

In an agony of confusion, the Doctor wracked his memory. And suddenly, like a file being uploaded into his brain, scores of images flashed across his mind's eye. How could he have been so stupid?

"Rose—I'm sorry—I'm being an ass—"

"You've been dreaming again," she said, a statement, not a question. "Sometime it just takes you a bit longer to wake up." She caressed his arm with one hand. "All those memories to sort."

"I'm the clone," the Doctor realized, speaking out loud. "The half-human clone that Donna created from my hand."

"You're still the Doctor, though," Rose told him, her fingers now running through the pelt of hair on his chest. "You remember everything we did together. That's what matters, not whether you've got two hearts or one."

"I do remember," the Doctor said. His breathing began to shift as her hand moved lower. "I remember everything now."

"Everything?" she teased.

"Aah—Rose—oh, my giddy aunt." The Doctor closed his eyes, letting Rose pleasure him with her hand. A few moments later, she turned him onto his back, straddling his hips with her muscular thighs.

"Now do you remember?" she breathed.

"Oh, yes," the Doctor gasped. He clutched her hips, gazing up at her sweaty face as they gyrated together. How could he forget?

(xv)

After they'd showered and dressed, the Doctor realized he and Rose were living in a cozy cottage on Pete and Jackie's extensive property, set back among some graceful trees. Hand in hand, they crossed the lawn together to the main house. Underfoot, the grass was brown and dead; overhead, bare tree limbs created a black latticework against the blue sky, and the air held a crystalline chill. The Doctor watched his breath puff out.

Memories kept flooding back, filling in the gap from the time he'd come to live in this universe. At first, he and Rose had stayed with the Tylers until the second house could be built. He'd been working with Rose and Pete at Torchwood One in London, where everyone knew him as Dr. John Smith. Thanks to some of Pete's less savory connections, the Doctor now had a full set of human identification papers. Since the wedding, Rose had been calling herself Rose Tyler Smith.

The Doctor remembered the imposing portico of the main house from the time that he—the other him—and Rose and Mickey had visited this universe. Now the door was unlocked, and he could see from the foyer that Jackie had transformed the house from a cold, impersonal showplace to a warm, inviting home, festooned at this time of year with Christmas decorations. The scents of breakfast and coffee made the Doctor's mouth water. From the deeper inside came the sound of Christmas music—Pete was playing the piano—and the laughter of a small boy.

A moment later, a tiny, red-haired whirlwind tore through the foyer, colliding with Rose.

"Look what Santa brought me!" he shouted, grabbing his sister's hand.

"All right, all right!" she laughed, winking at the Doctor.

Unwrapped gifts and toys lay strewn across the parlor. In one corner stood a magnificent green fir tree, which the Doctor recalled they'd cut down in the dense woods on their property. Every branch sparkled with ornaments and glitter and lights that winked like tiny, multicolored gemstones. At the apex of the tree soared a white-robed angel with outspread wings, a golden horn raised to her lips. A fire crackled in the fireplace, warming the room.

Jackie sat on one of the sofas, legs curled beneath her, clad in a fuzzy pink dressing gown, talking on the phone. She paused for a moment to call out, "Happy Christmas!" before resuming her conversation. "Oh, it's just Rose and himself, come over for breakfast."

Pete emerged from the music room to embrace his daughter and son-in-law. "Happy Christmas," he said. "Breakfast?"

"Sounds wonderful," the Doctor said.

"If Tony will let me," Rose laughed, sitting on the floor to look at the excited toddler's new toys. She and the Doctor played with Tony until Pete called that breakfast was ready. He'd made omelets and bacon and toast. The coffee had been brewed to buttery-rich perfection. In the center of the kitchen sat a large basket of citrus fruit, a gift from their American colleagues at Torchwood Florida. Pete had cut and sectioned a grapefruit for Rose and the Doctor to share, the flesh plump and pink, each mouthful a juicy explosion of sweetness in the mouth. By the time they'd finished eating—Rose groaning, gorged almost into a stupor—Jackie was off the phone. She puttered out into the kitchen, kissed everyone, and poured herself a cup of tea. The Doctor stared at the front of her dressing gown, which extruded outward at her abdomen.

"You're pregnant," he said.

"You didn't get the memo?" Pete smiled.

"Someone drank too much brandy last night," Jackie sighed, ruffling the Doctor's hair as she took a seat at the table. "I'm not an old woman yet, you know."

"Sorry, he's a bit out of sorts," said Rose.

"Just so long as he remembers who he's married to," Jackie said.

The Doctor put an arm around Rose. "Like I could forget."

"Yeah, well you didn't look so sure of that when you woke up this morning," Rose laughed, giving the Doctor a playful nudge.

More memories flashed into the Doctor's mind. Jackie was about four months along. She'd already had a test and knew the baby would be a girl; she'd settled on the name Emma Claire.

He sat listening while Rose chatted with her parents. Tony toddled into the kitchen, pushing a toy truck around the floor. The Doctor basked in the sense of warmth and familiarity, the cozy steadiness of living life in one place, one day at a time, the kind of existence that for most of his life would have bored him senseless—the very idea of "settling down" was anathema to him. But now he reveled in the love of his unlikely family. Outside the window, Jackie's garden lay serene in the mellow, diffuse winter sunlight. He watched birds flitter into and out of the feeder. The small sounds of the household contributed to his sense of contentment: not only the voices around him, but the hum of the refrigerator, the rumble of the furnace, the tiny clicking noises made by the coffee maker. Now and again he would hear the faint pop of burning wood from the fireplace, or the calls of the birds outside.

So why, when everything was so right, did the Doctor feel so wrong?

Maybe he always felt like this. Could there be any existence more strange than clone-hood? Knowing you were literally a genetic carbon copy of another person? It was different from being someone's identical twin—he had been created by accident, from a piece of his own flesh. He possessed all the memories from the original Doctor's centuries of life. He possessed the personality of the original Doctor's tenth incarnation. He possessed all the knowledge of a Time Lord. If the TARDIS had materialized right here in the kitchen, he could have walked inside it and operated the controls without even needing to think. In every important sense, he was the Doctor—but he wasn't. He had only one heart. He was aging—slowly and subtly, but he could see the difference in his appearance, even after only a few months in this universe. He would grow old with Rose, and die. There would be no regeneration; their bodies would lie in the earth together. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. He found the thought peaceful, comforting almost, knowing that one day all awareness would cease.

But this wasn't right. Why did this world feel so artificial? He went to the window and stared out at the garden, the bird feeder. In the distance, the treetops moved in a faint breeze. If he listened carefully, he could hear the occasional sound of a car passing by on the road beyond the hedges. He could see tiny irregularities in the texture of the lawn, the pale veins in the smooth granite countertop beneath his hands. Behind him, Jackie was cleaning Tony's nose with a tissue. If this world were artificial, the level of sensory detail was staggering.

"Well, let's open some presents," Jackie was saying. "Otherwise we'll still be in our dressing gowns at dinnertime."

In the parlor, they opened gifts, exclaiming as each item emerged from its layers of gift wrap and tissue. Tony grew tired of playing—he'd been up since before five, according to Jackie—and curled up on the sofa beside Pete for a nap. When all the gifts had been opened and thank-yous exchanged, Rose and Jackie vanished into the kitchen to begin the preparations for dinner, while Pete tidied up the parlor.

"Sorry—I'm a bit useless at anything domestic," the Doctor said.

"Do what you do best," Pete said, pointing through the doorway to a small office where a laptop sat on a desk. "Check that we're not being invaded."

With a brief laugh, the Doctor went into the office and sat at the computer, logging into his account at Torchwood, his three passwords coming immediately to mind. He checked all their surveillance outlets, finding nothing of note. No emails or emergency messages, either.

"For once, a peaceful Christmas," he said out loud. "Where's the fun in that?" He surfed the web, and because he could, he hacked into the government's network and made sure they weren't withholding any information from Torchwood. Then he activated a subroutine that would prevent the president's geeks from tracing the breach back to Pete's computers. The entire exercise took less than five minutes. Bored, the Doctor wandered back outside and strolled about the grounds.

He told himself again and again that everything around him was real. If he wished, he could have taken one of Pete's cars and driven into the city, or anywhere else in England. Pete even had a small private airplane; three months earlier, the family had taken an autumn holiday in the south of France, flying into an airport in Cannes. The Doctor could recall the places they'd seen, the food they'd eaten, the way the sky had looked, the warm Mediterranean sun, even pieces of conversation he'd had with Rose, with Pete, with Jackie.

Would he always feel like this, or was he just "settling in" as Rose sometimes said? The Doctor noted the shifting position of the sun, the small shadows that flashed across the ground when birds flew by overhead. This was his world now. He lived here, and in a few decades, he'd die here. Wasn't that what he wanted? Or did he secretly wish to be back in the TARDIS, in his Time Lord body, traveling through time and space?

Maybe some subconscious wish for his old life was seeping through, causing this sense of fracture to the day's continuity. The Doctor did resent, more than he cared to admit, the cavalier way he'd been dumped in this world. His original self had been correct, though, that the two of them could not inhabit the same universe, let alone the same TARDIS. The Doctor knew this, but it was difficult not to feel second-best, cast off, rejected. Even his marriage to Rose, who he loved, felt like a consolation prize in that light.

No, he shouldn't think like that. He loved Rose—she was his life, his everything. How gutted he'd been when he'd lost her, thrown into an emotional tailspin from which he'd needed a ridiculous amount of time to recover. How sweet had been their reunion! When he'd had the chance to be with her for the rest of this human life, he'd taken it gladly. Yet how much happier he would be if the two of them had a TARDIS—that was what he'd liked best about his love affair with Rose, traveling with her through time, showing her the universe.

Without realizing it, the Doctor reached the furthest edge of the property and began to make a circuit along the perimeter. The path took him past hedges that lined the inside of the tall, black iron fence, into the woods, through part of Jackie's garden, and into more woods. The trees grew densely together here, and the Doctor had to make his way with care. Perhaps because these lower branches received no sunlight they were bare, even the conifers. The Doctor frowned: some of the pines looked sickly and battered, whole boughs broken off, devoid of needles, save a small, sad-looking green thatch at the very top.

He'd have to tell Pete about this—if the trees were diseased they'd need to be cut down before the pestilence could spread around the rest of the property. As the Doctor made his way among the bare, matchstick-like trunks, noting places where bark was peeling away, he began to feel that it wasn't the trees but the whole of this world that was ill and dying. He quickened his pace, glad to emerge into sunlight.

"Where've you been?" Jackie demanded when he got back to the house. "Look at you—dirt all over your shoes! Go and wash—company'll be here by half-five. Go on—shift!"

Rose, who was setting the dining room table, looked up at the Doctor and grinned.

"She doesn't change, does she?"

The Doctor laughed ruefully. "Never."

(xvi)

"Company" turned out to be other Torchwood staff: Gwen, Owen, and Tosh, as well as Willow and Daniel Osborne, two diminutive red-haired geeks, recruited by Pete from California. Family filled out the rest of the table: Jackie's sister and their mother, Pete's aunt, a couple of his cousins, and their children, slightly older than Tony. Since nobody but Rose and Pete knew about the death of Pete's first wife, everyone assumed motherhood had been responsible for the changes in Jackie's personality.

The Doctor remembered asking Rose, "What did Pete tell everyone? How'd he explain his wife miraculously returning to life?"

"He never told them she died—he couldn't exactly tell people she was turned into a Cyberman," Rose had responded. "He told them she'd run off and he didn't know where she was—they were getting divorced anyway, remember? So when Mum and I came to live here, Dad just said he and Mum patched things up."

"What about you?" the Doctor had asked. "A daughter that came from nowhere?"

"That's the clever bit," Rose had laughed. "They said I was a kid they'd put up for adoption when they weren't married, but that I'd traced them, and that's why he and Mum separated—cos they had to get it all sorted. They got back together and I moved in with them."

"And does everyone believe that?"

"Sometimes they look at us like they think it's all naff, but what're they gonna do? It's Mum and Dad's business, really."

Maybe everyone just accepted that the Tylers were eccentric by nature. When the Doctor had arrived on the scene and married Rose almost immediately, nobody had questioned it—nor did they question why Rose addressed her husband as "Doctor." Everyone called him that and referred to him as the Doctor rather than John or Dr. Smith. But then, the Doctor thought, Torchwood was hardly an ordinary kind of workplace. If people got their knickers in a twist over the Tylers' domestic arrangements, Pete and Jackie weren't going to fret about it.

Christmas dinner was a magnificent affair. Jackie had roasted a goose and a turkey; there were trays of every conceivable vegetable and delicacy, and baskets of homemade bread. Pete had fetched up a half-dozen bottles of his best wines from the extensive wine cellar, and everyone ate until they were ready to burst. Outside the tall windows, darkness had fallen, and the long table glowed with candles, the entire dining room suffused with a deep golden light.

"Don't worry about the mess." Jackie shooed everyone into the parlor, where they exchanged gifts with friends and extended family. The children sat playing on the floor together while the adults drank and talked and enjoyed the warm fire. Rose sat curled into the Doctor's side, his arm around her shoulders. The hands of the clock turned and started on their next journey around the hour, but nobody wanted the day to end. The Doctor had begun to understand the human capacity for nostalgia. Not that he'd never experienced that emotion, but he was more keenly aware now of the fleeting nature of this happiness. Tomorrow would come and bring with it different things: joy, pain, sorrow, disappointment, regret. There would be other Christmases, other celebrations, but never again this exact day. Now that traveling back in time to any moment he pleased was not an option, the Doctor had begun to cherish even common experiences as the most precious things he could have imagined.

Two hours after dinner, Jackie served dessert, a vast buffet of sweets, accompanied by hot chocolate, coffee, and tea. While their guests lolled about on the furniture, Rose and Jackie began washing up.

The children were the first to surrender to sleep, yawning and rubbing fists into eyes before finally slumping into their parents' laps. The adults began to reluctantly gather up gifts and bags and, at Jackie's insistence, leftover food. Pete's cousins left first, carrying their children, then Jackie's sister and their mother, until at last only the Torchwood staff remained. They sat drinking and gossiping until the fire burned low and the grandfather clock tolled out the twelve strokes of midnight.

"Well, happy Boxing Day," said Pete. "Everyone all right to drive home?" Jackie had put Tony to bed and retired herself about two hours earlier.

"I'm the designated driver," said Tosh, ushering Gwen and Owen out to her car.

"The same," Willow said. "The one night Daniel lets me drive."

"Guinness and wrong-side driving," Daniel agreed. "They don't really mix well."

As the Osbornes' Mini crunched away across the gravel driveway, Rose leaned into Pete's side.

"Thanks for a wonderful Christmas, Dad."

He kissed the top of her head. "Every Christmas is wonderful with you and your mother here."

Rose reached out an arm to encircle the Doctor. "It's our first Christmas together, too," she said.

"Well, since we've been married," the Doctor said.

"Hmm, and no alien invasion, either," said Rose, gazing up at the star-strewn sky.

"Looks like they all took the night off," Pete agreed.

They went back into the house, and Pete insisted the younger pair return to their cottage. "You're only young once," he said.

"I'm not young," the Doctor huffed. "I'm older than you."

"Young marrieds," Pete said. "Now, go." The Doctor knew Pete stayed up late at night, puttering about the house, extinguishing the fire and making sure doors and windows were locked, tidying up. This habit dated back to his Gemini days, and also, the Doctor suspected, from the waning days of Pete's unhappy first marriage.

Rose didn't argue. Smiling, she took the Doctor's arm and they let themselves out through one of the doors at the rear of the house. Hand in hand they walked in the chilly air to their cottage. It seemed to the Doctor they'd only just walked to the main house for breakfast, and now the day was over, a day that could never be lived exactly the same way again. He sighed, allowing himself to revel in the sense of melancholy, so different from his prior experiences with grief—this was a gentler and altogether more agreeable emotion—it lacked the piercing pain of his past losses and tragedies.

In the cottage, Rose gave him a smile that he'd learned to interpret with no difficulty. She didn't turn on the overhead lights, instead switching on a couple of small lamps. The Doctor experienced that familiar below-the-belt tightening, one of those things about a human body he'd had to get used to—he no longer had the effortless Time Lord control over his physiological reflexes. It still disconcerted him how often he was distracted by carnal thoughts of Rose, and at what inappropriate times. When he was supposed to be thinking about algorithms or cataloging contraband alien technology or mapping solar flares, he'd be instead thinking about Rose's smooth, firm breasts, the pertness of her derriere, or the slick, hot wetness of her vagina. He'd be thinking about the way she wrapped her fingers around the hard length of his penis, or the way she liked to tickle gently the insides of his thighs. And the sheer variety of positions she enjoyed! She also used her mouth on him in the most extraordinary and delightful ways, and she encouraged him to do likewise—

Rose burst out laughing.

"What?" he said, indignant.

"You've got that look on your face."

"Am I really so transparent?"

"Yes." She stood on her tiptoes to kiss him.

"Well, whose fault is that?" the Doctor teased. He kissed her again and said, "You know, your whole body is a distraction—and don't get me started on your scent when you—"

She put a shushing finger to his lips. "No science lecture," she scolded. "I mean, it's sexy coming from you, but it does kill the mood. Now, come on, and I'll give you a Christmas present you'll never forget."

The Doctor's stomach did happy little flip-flops as she led him into their bedroom.

(xv)

Rose was true to her word. Especially for Christmas, she'd indulged in a marvelous confection, a lingerie set in deep red silk, trimmed in black lace, the bodice designed to look like a Victorian corset. Silky black stockings with coquettish back seams encased her legs, and a pair of black patent-leather spike-heeled shoes completed the outfit. The visual was stunning, and had precisely the effect on the Doctor that Rose had intended. The next hour passed in a blur of sweat and pheromones.

"You all right?" she asked when they were finished.

"Hmm?" the Doctor asked, still basking in post-coital euphoria, every inch of him throbbing with pleasure. "How could I not be all right?"

"Dunno," she said. "You've been out of sorts all day."

"I'm fine," he smiled. "It's just that this—you know, human life—takes some getting used to."

After another lingering kiss, she said, "I'll tell you something else, if you're ready for a surprise."

"Another present?" he asked, putting a naughty emphasis on the word.

"Sort of." She took his hand and led it to her belly, giving him a meaningful look. The Doctor needed a moment to connect the pieces, but when he did, his heart lurched.

"Rose," he breathed. "Oh, Rose! Are you sure?"

"Had a test and everything," she grinned. "They rang me back yesterday. Not even Mum knows."

The Doctor pulled her into his arms, a wild elation soaring through him. "I didn't think—" he said. "I wasn't sure if we could—if it was even possible—" They'd never used contraceptives, not once, over the entire course of their marriage, and after several months, the Doctor had begun to assume that he didn't possess enough human DNA to conceive a child. He'd never been so excited to be proven wrong.

"It's possible," she laughed. "Completely possible. A part Time Lord, part human baby."

The Doctor tried to imagine it—a baby. A child—his child. His and Rose's. A child to fill the horrible void created by the loss of his family on Gallifrey. He tried to envision its hair, its eyes, its smile. It would be intelligent, surely—perhaps time-sensitive as well—perhaps the first member of an entirely new species.

"I'm gonna tell Mum tomorrow," Rose was saying. "I know she'll kill me for not telling her sooner."

"Both of you expecting at once," the Doctor said. "We'll have prams lined up like airplanes on a runway, up to our ears in nappies."

"Dad'll be chuffed," said Rose. "Mum, not so much—I can hear it now." In a spot-on impersonation of Jackie's voice, she said, "'I'm too young to be a grandmother!'"

The Doctor went rigid, feeling like a cold wind had blown through his psyche.

"What?" asked Rose, her brows pulling together.

"What you just said—it's exactly what Jackie would say."

"She's my mum. I know her pretty well."

"It's too perfect." The Doctor pulled away from Rose, ignoring her hurt expression. "This is all too perfect."

Rose sat up, clasping her arms about her knees. "I'm the one who's supposed to be having funny moods, not you."

The Doctor was on his feet, heedless of his complete nakedness. "This isn't real. This world—it's too perfect. Everything's exactly what I'd expect—not one thing is wrong; there isn't one piece that doesn't ring true."

"Oh, God, is this because of that—that meta-crisis thingamabob?" asked Rose. "Because of that weird gene splice between you and Donna? Bit of a stroppy cow, wasn't she? Some of that must've rubbed off."

The Doctor rounded on Rose—or the thing pretending to be Rose—and said, "Donna Noble is a million times the woman you'll ever be. You're not even Rose—you're just some incredibly clever simulacrum that's using her face and voice, trying to lull me into complacency by showing me a life I can never have. You're good—you're very, very good, I'll give you that—but you're not Rose Tyler."

Rose's eyes welled up. "Doctor—Doctor, how can you say all those horrible things?" With a hiccupping little sob, she said, "Look—if you want a divorce, just tell me—I know you hate it here, being human, stuck in one place and time—"

As she spoke, the Doctor was aware of the world outside their cottage falling away. He went to a window, but all he could see was black nothingness.

"No," said Rose, "no—don't go out there, Doctor! Stay here with me!" Her voice broke, so appealingly, causing his emotional control to wobble like an out-of-synch gyroscope. For one horrible moment, he contemplated surrender, contemplated returning to her arms, to her bed, to the soft, velvet chains of this world, as seductive as the honey-sweet nectar in a Venus flytrap. "Don't leave me alone again!"

Ignoring the spasm of guilt, the Doctor grabbed the nearest chair.

"No!" Rose screamed. "No—Doctor—don't!"

It was too late: the Doctor hurled the chair through the window. The glass exploded outward, and a cold, sucking wind rushed into the room. The last thing the Doctor heard before he flew out into the freezing darkness was Rose's long, unbroken wail, mixed with the howl of a frustrated beast. Then there was nothing.

(xvi)

A quiet, familiar humming awoke him. The Doctor opened his eyes, feeling something cool and smooth beneath his cheek. The glass floor of the console room. He was in the TARDIS—alive, sane, safe. A quick hand to the bowtie at his collar confirmed he was back in his most current body.

"Dreaming again," he scolded himself. "Need to get more sleep. Now—where was I?"

He was alone in the TARDIS, the time rotor rising and falling in its steady, familiar cadence. No companions—he must be on his own.

"That's right," he said, still talking out loud. "Amy and Rory went home for good, didn't they? It's just you and me again, isn't it, Sexy?"

An almost imperceptible shift in the engines' humming seemed to confirm this.

The Doctor tried to remember what he'd been doing before he'd fallen asleep, but everything was a jumble. Not that such confusion was new to him—he'd lived so long, experienced so much, that dreams were always apt to leave him disoriented. Maybe that was why he avoided sleeping—or tried to avoid it, anyway.

He set the ship's coordinates. "Time for a holiday," he said. "What do you think, Old Girl? A few quiet days on Calabar Three, just what the Doctor ordered."

The materialization sequence began, and when the final vibration ended, the Doctor strode over to the TARDIS doors and opened them wide.

Outside, all lay dim and quiet. The Doctor stood in the doorway, listening, letting his telepathic sense flow out. He didn't like what he felt—a quivering sensation, as if the very air were alive. The last time he'd experienced this phenomenon, he'd been in—

"The Library," he said out loud. "Yes, of course." The ship had materialized in the planet's core. The Doctor could just make out the bulky casing that housed the Library's massive mainframe. "Well, let's shed some light on the matter." He darted back to the TARDIS console and toggled a few switches. The flashing light on top of the box suddenly increased in intensity, illuminating the area around the ship, creating a circle of bright light extending about twelve meters in all directions.

"Much better." The Doctor left the doors open and stepped outside, turning carefully, looking about, avoiding the shadow cast by the ship. "I don't fancy becoming the Vashta Nerada's next meal." There—the large control chair that River had used—would ultimately use—to end her life. Further away, the Doctor spotted the lumpy shape of a white spacesuit lying on the floor: the skeletal remains of Anita, one of River's ill-fated crew members.

The Doctor circled the area slowly, a sense of dread building inside him. He spotted the silhouette of a courtesy node, an oval disk mounted on a tall white abstract sculpture. With a quiet whir, the disk began to rotate, turning to face the Doctor. The last time he'd been here, the node's flesh aspect had been that of Charlotte Lux, the doomed little girl for whom the Library had been created. Even before the disk finished turning, the Doctor knew whose face he would see now.

River's eyes were closed, as if she were sleeping. Her face was very still, which seemed terribly wrong—it was wrong not to see her animated by intelligence, passion, wit, her irrepressible joie de vivre. The Doctor reached out a tentative hand, stroking her cool, smooth cheek, his eyes welling up. He'd been avoiding this for so long, shoving this guilty knowledge to the back of his mind, hating that he'd had to conduct his entire maddening, intoxicating, wildly out-of-order relationship with River knowing one thing, one horrible thing: the exact time, place, and circumstances of her death. Even as he'd grown to love her, he'd grieved her loss. Above all, he hated that he had to keep this knowledge from her—the ultimate spoiler.

"'She has a lovely face,'" he quoted. "'God in his mercy send her grace.'"

Without warning, the eyes opened: wide and blue-gray, unchanged. River blinked a few times, spotted him, and smiled widely.

"Hello, Sweetie," she said.

The Doctor couldn't speak.

"Oh, hush, don't cry," she scolded him. "You must be between companions now—why else would you come back for a visit with the dearly departed missus?"

His voice cracked. "I miss you, River. I'm—I'm so sorry about this."

"Don't be," she said cheerfully. "As afterlives go, this one has a lot to recommend it—good friends, a couple of charming children who never grow up and get annoying—they're Donna's kids, can you believe that? She dreamed them up, and they're still here because Cal wanted playmates. And the stories! Oh, the stories we can live—a new journey every day, and we still haven't explored a fraction of the books in this place—the worlds, the adventures!"

"Are you happy?" the Doctor asked.

Tenderly, River said, "Well, I miss you, Sweetie. Why don't you come in and join me for a while?" Her eyes rolled to the right, in the direction of the console chair.

The temptation was staggering, as enticing as the Doctor's dream of Rose. How easy it would be to leave behind all his pains and regrets, his never-ending loneliness, and join his wife in a world of digital make-believe. He knew he could never enter that world for just "a while," as River suggested. Once he was in there, with her, he'd never leave again; in the far future, would some team of archeologists find the mummified husk of his remains still in that chair?

And he realized, too, that River's offer and his dream of Rose were one and the same thing—a ploy to make him surrender.

"I'm sorry," he said, touching her face again. "I'm so sorry—when first I met you, I had no idea who you were, only that you were someday going to be so important to me. I had to save you—even in some small way, like this. I never had a chance to ask you if that was what you wanted."

Her eyes narrowed, and the Doctor felt an ominous thunder emanating from her gaze.

"Well, now that you mention it, Sweetie, what in hell were you thinking? I'm miserable in here, Doctor—miserable, bored, frustrated—you couldn't let me go, could you? Couldn't even consign me to peaceful oblivion! Oh, no, you had to upload me like a Time Lord ghost into this wretched machine! Just so you could come here and look at me and shed your damned crocodile tears! Do you feel good about this, Doctor? Are you happy knowing you 'saved' me into a virtual reality that's more like my idea of Hell?"

So immense was her anger that the Doctor stepped back a couple of paces, as if she were truly capable of harming him. Then she started to laugh, cruel and mocking.

"Look at you," she said. "You know, your professors on Gallifrey were right all those centuries ago. You really are pathetic. A pathetic, good-for-nothing excuse for a Time Lord."

The reality of the situation filtered into the Doctor's consciousness in gradual stages. He was in the Papal Mainframe, knowledge he'd blocked from the start of his dream about Rose. The part of his mind that yearned for peace, for escape, had taken control, tantalizing him with the possibility of release, of unending happiness with a woman he loved. Normal human life with Rose in another universe, a fantasy existence with River in a virtual reality—there wasn't much difference between the two. Both represented a longing for something he desired, but something that also would bore him to the point of madness. Acknowledging this paradox provided the Doctor with an unexpected moment of clarity and peace.

"I'm tired of this game," he said, addressing the Papal Mainframe itself. "Tired of my friends' faces and voices being used against me. And I don't have to play if I don't want to." He made a mocking little salute with his hand. "Buh-bye." Ignoring River's final insult, he turned on his heel and strode back into the TARDIS, slamming the doors shut behind him.

"Enough of this," he said, setting the controls. "Let's be on our way, Sexy."

When the ship materialized again, the Doctor opened the doors to find himself in the second-floor hallway of Amy's house in Leadworth.

He sighed, muttering, "Always here." He called out, "Hello?" and looked about, but there didn't seem to be anyone at home. The Doctor pushed open the door into Amy's bedroom—no, Amelia's bedroom: the narrow bed covered with a patchwork quilt, the desk and table strewn with her artwork. The Doctor studied all the childish drawings and representations of himself and the TARDIS, over and over and over again, as if Amelia had thought she could somehow will him to appear if she created enough images of him.

"Always disappointing someone, aren't you?" Ten strolled in from the hallway, hands in his trouser pockets. "So many friends—they worshipped you like a god, but you let them down, time and time again. You could never be what they needed you to be—father, brother, lover, not even a very good friend. Did you ever think about that—the hearts you broke, the lives you shattered?"

"I never compelled anyone to come with me," the Doctor said.

"No, but you enticed them," Ten said. "Lured them with the promise of space-time travel. What silly, simple human could resist the chance to see the stars, the past, the future? And how many of them left you of their own volition? Most didn't leave until circumstance—or you—forced them to. They were besotted with you, with your life of endless freedom."

The Doctor said, "I never misled anyone."

"You didn't have to," Ten said. "Their own imaginations did that… so many friends, infatuated, waiting in the hope you'd come to regard them as something more."

"I didn't encourage that," the Doctor huffed.

Ten looked around at little Amelia's artwork. "She's just a replacement for Susan, isn't she? Like so many of the others. That's why people like Mickey and Rory rubbed you the wrong way—they didn't worship you; they could see you for what your really are—a time-traveling parasite, preying on the dreams of the innocent. You love it, don't you, the adoring way they all look at you—even one as clever as River. That's why so many of your companions are human—they're children, like Susan, always in awe of the great man, never able to see the little worm hiding inside the all-knowing hero."

Outside the house, thunder rumbled and lighting flashed.

"Are you quite done?" the Doctor asked. "Because I'm tired of listening." He pointed the sonic screwdriver at the wall. With a growl and a hiss, the jagged crack opened. Beyond lay nothing, the blackness of the Void. Under his breath, the Doctor said, "'Out flew the web and floated wide/ The mirror crack'd from side to side.'"

"''The curse is come upon me,' cried/ The Lady of Shalott,'" said Ten, finishing the quotation. "A bit melodramatic, don't you think?"

"It suits," the Doctor said. "I'm half-sick of shadows."

"And so you end your own life to escape it." Ten rocked back and forth on his feet. "Coward. As usual."

"It's the only way out," the Doctor said. "Surrendering to Rose or River would've kept me in the Papal Mainframe forever—which, as ways to destroy your enemies go, isn't a bad one. Well, sorry—this is one Song you can't kill me softly with."

"You'll never tell her, will you?" Ten gloated. "She won't learn your dirty secret until the very last moments of her life. Cruel, wouldn't you say?"

"Too much foreknowledge is a dangerous thing," the Doctor said. "For her. Even for me." And he strode toward the wall, the crack, vanishing into nothingness.

(xvii)

He returned to his body with a jolt, jumping back from the glowing control panel, shaking his arms and hands, as if to rid himself of the memory of the experience. Beside him, River stood gasping, her eyes wild. Then she put her hands on her hips and demanded, "Doctor, why did you kill those guards?"

To be continued…